2010 - Half time review

That's what the schools are calling the mid term tests these days - half time reviews. Anyway, it seems that my posts are turning into quarterly updates rather than just random postings. I find myself asking that same question again - where have the past few months gone?

Since my last post in April, we have:

• 
  
  (finally) gone to Pengerrang. Twice in fact - once by boat from Changi Point, and another by car because I was adamant about not being left to the mercy of the bumboats. Apparently, the boats won't move till they have filled their maximum quota of 12 passengers.
  
  This town is so laid-back, I'm actually contemplating of retiring there. Maybe open up a foot reflexology place or something. The seafood was great (in particular the steamed lobsters *slurp!*), the bay tay sor was heavenly (hot from the oven!) and the kopi peng at the coffeeshop was POWER!!
• 
  
  found more old primary school friends on Facebook, who proceeded to upload embarassing pictures of us way back when. Realised nothing much has changed - I'm still the clown now that I was 20 odd years or so ago.
• 
  
  sold our flat and moved back with my parents, which feels odd after so many years. From having our own place, we are now squeezed into one single room - bed, clothes, TV, guitar, laptops and associated peripherals. We had to rent a storeroom at IMM's Extraspace to store the stuff that we didn't need for now.
• 
  
  moved our church premises from CSC to International Community School at Jubilee Road. This was the old building which was Yusoff Ishak Secondary School eons ago (for those of you who are old enough to remember). RHC's application to take over the old Queenstown Bowl is still not firmed yet, and has left us wondering if the whole fiasco with City Harvest has affected this. But we trust that God is soveriegn and will bring us where he wants us to go.
• 
  
  finally gotten our website for our business up and running after applying for a grant from the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA), which should be unveiled soon. On the verge of punching the designers, but I reckon when all this is over a letter to the Forum page and the relevant authorities will have more impact.

At the end of it all, God has been good. He has led us this far and I am positive he will continue to show us the way.

For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

Jeremiah 29:11

2010 so far

Not meaning to sound like a broken record, time REALLY flies. It’s been over three months since my last post and since then many events have transpired. Christmas came and went, the Lunar New Year came and went.

Vel finally went to P1 in January. She was probably more excited about it than we were, polishing her shoes the weekend before and waking up in time to gulp down some soft boiled eggs and her mandatory glass of warm milk. Being the typical kiasu parents, we tailed the school bus in our car to make sure she got to school just fine.

Career wise, my job still wasn’t getting anywhere. So in January, I decided to go back to what I loved doing best – teaching (albeit privately). The Lord has been good and opened many doors for me; I am now a Speech and Drama trainer by day and a full time tutor by night (or more specifically late afternoon). On hindsight, I should have thought of this sooner rather than hopping from one dead end job to another for the past year or so. I now have more free time on my hands that allows me to dabble in other endeavours, less sleepless nights and about the same amount of money (without the fringe benefits like annual leave of course).

Penny and I have also embarked on a new business venture that is somewhat related to the previous post about the prophecy that was given to me. We didn’t really plan for it, but one thing led to another and before we knew it we were opening a bank account for our business. Things are still a little misty now while we work on a few prospects, but so far the Lord has been good and blessed us with many open doors to ‘test water’. Nothing concrete thus far, but I believe that God has something in store for us when the timing is right.

It has been a rocky first quarter of 2010. We’ve had ups and downs but we will persevere. I believe that this year will be a year of breakthrough for us.

Cactus in the wilderness

Been feeling down of late. That same question that has kept awake on countless nights before has returned to keep playing over and over again in my mind like a broken vinyl - why am I faced with another challenge YET AGAIN just when I thought I had left one behind and could finally move ahead to straighten my life.

That being the case, I have been fasting, praying and crying out to God the past week while meditating on some scripture from Psalm 55:

'But I call to God, and the LORD saves me. Evening, morning and noon I cry out in distress, and he hears my voice.' (v16-17)

This portion of scripture penned by the psalmist described exactly how I felt. Desperate, alone and drained from the many assaults that he had been put through. Truth be told, what the psalmist experienced was perhaps far worse than what I had endured, but the resulting emotions at the end were certainly similar.

On Friday night, during worship at cell, I continue to literally CRY out to God and ask for strength. I was not even interested in singing the song right, just opening up my heart and stretching out my hands, asking God that I may just dip my finger into His presence just so that I know He has not forsaken me. As always, God never disappoints.

At the end of the worship Rob said 'Rennie, God impressed upon me to share something with you'. I was speechless. From a guy who barely knew me personally, I knew it had to be from God because the words he spoke were so true and it sent a resounding vibe of reassurance ringing through my head. Here was a man with his own struggles, yet he was willing to be used by God to encourage a fellow brother who was too caught up in his own turmoil to hear God speak.

Rob went on to say that God gave him a vision of a cactus in the wilderness. On the cactus was a fruit that God was tending to. It will be tough for the fruit to bloom in the wilderness, on a cactus no less, but when the time was ripe for the fruit to be finally harvested and eaten, it would be so sweet that even the genetically engineered fruits in the world would pale drastically in comparison. He mentioned that God has seen my heart comparing myself with my worldy peers around me, wondering why I've not achieved as much as them. But God said to look to Him and nothing else because there are several areas He is continually dealing with before that fruit can be harvested.

Needless to say, I was in tears by the end of it. All because I serve and awesome and mighty God.

Vel's graduation

After missing last year's graduation concert as a result of her chicken pox, we made sure Velouria didn't miss this year's as it was going to be her last with Grace House. We, along with her teachers, were quite worried as she had taken ill for several days before the concert and hence missing out on quite a few rehearsals.

But praise the Lord she recovered pretty much quickly and was back to her usual nonsense self again; reciting all her lines (apparently the graduating K2 class was given the honour of giving an opening address to the audience on Mandarin), dancing away and singing all the songs with much gusto.

We were up bright and early and made our way to the school before the required 8am. Judging by the crowd there, we were not the only kiasu parents and being typical Singaporeans a queue started forming outside the hall even before 8.30am. Amazing!

As always, the pre-concert wait was a long one, made worse by our attempts to reserve seats for my parents and brother who had problems parking. When the concert finally began, we were so all excited and straining our necks to catch Velouria whose already petite frame was made smaller by the distance of the stage from our seats.

There were many endearing acts by the various classes, with one of WWE proportions where one boy started using his toy guitar (they were doing a rock n roll number) to hit his classmates around him. He was eventaully removed from the stage and I can only imagine the embarassed parents cowering in their seats.

Finally, it was time for Vel's act. They were doing a Chinese dance number and despite reminders to stay clear of the aisles, I still managed to sneak to the front of the stage to catch a small reel of Vel in action.

As always, the concert ended in a finale where all the classes came out to sing a song together. The area was so crowded that we lost Velouria in the sea of heads!

After the concert ended, even the pick up point was crowded with parents eager to pick their children up. I didn't bother to elbow my way to the front of the crowd and just waited for the crowd to slowly disperse. One of Vel's teachers eventually spotted me chilling out in my corner and brought her out for me.

Famished by then, we all headed to Red Star for a fantastic dim sum lunch to end of the morning.

Vel's P1 orientation at St Margaret's

There are several monumental moments in a parent's life with the Primary 1 orientation being one of them. It marks a new chapter of your child's life journey as she leaves the laidback kindergarten life behind and heralds the begnning of what I term as the 'stressful years' - homework, tests, assesment papers, exams, more homework, more tests, more assesment papers, more exams and, of course, CCAs.

Fearful of the parking, we arrived at the school quite early, only to find that parking was STILL a problem. Tired of driving in circles around Mt. Sophia, I finally decided to leave the car just a few metres from the main gate (blatantly ignoring the double yellow lines since there were already cars parked there). Penny and Velouria were nowhere to be found and I realised that they were with the uniform vendor. It was a quite a hilarious exercise just watching Vel try on her soon-to-be school uniform and PT attires. Despite putting on the smallest size available, it still looked too big for her. I'm sure I will look back on this day with fond memories when she finally outgrows her current uniform.

On the way to the school hall, we even bought a teddy bear in St. Margaret's garb to support some parent volunteers who were raising funds for needy students. As we were ushered into our seats, the girls were all seated in the front on the hall seperated from their parents. Velouria, as usual, was more than enthusiastic to mingle with her new friends. The girls were later ushered out of the hall to be taken care of by 'big sisters' while the parents remained to sit through the orientation programme with usual - speech from the principal, familiarisation with the school's facilities and various programmes, etc.

When it ended an hour later, all the parents burst out of the hall and began to visit the various vendors to do the necessary. Me, I took a stroll in the rain to Parklane to withdraw cash to pay for the schoool bus, books, etc after the uniforms burned away most of the money I had on me (who knew that the vendors only took cash, whatever happened to those mobile NETS machines?? Sheesh!!).

We ended our afternoon with a little snack at the canteen and chatting with a parent of one of Vel's future classmate. Only one thing to say - so exciting!

Durian session

Some liken the pungent odour to a pair of overused, sweaty socks; others will drive for miles and kill their closest kin to find and savour the perfect fruit.

I obviously belong to the latter group and found it only fitting to celebrate the end of my long bout of flu with a round of the thorny fruit. It had been a while since we last binged on durians (we used to have ‘durian parties’; aptly named because we had nothing but, er, durians!), so when Penny suggested that we take a short drive to the nearby market to get some I was all for it.

They are probably in oversupply this year because we were spoilt for choice when we reached the stall. Normally price-tagged by weight, there were D24s that were priced according to size – ranging from $1 each for small ones about the size of my head to $3 each for larger ones about the size of Andre the Giant’s head.

Not wanting to look el cheapo, we settled for the $2 ones because they didn’t look very much smaller than their $3 counterparts. We singled out about five of these little babies and proceeded to consume them kampung style – squatting on the floor and prying them open barbarically with my bare hands.

Licking every finger on both our hands, we ended our jaunt by picking out another five to pack home.

Akan datang: drum lessons

They say the best way to learn is to teach. Since I started drumming in church again two years ago after my century long hiatus, I have been toying with the idea of taking drum lessons. However, several lame excuses ranging from the lack of time to a supposedly deteriorating hand-eye-leg co-ordination had convinced me otherwise.

Recently, Justin and Natalie, along with their friend Deon, had been bitten by the drumming bug ever since they witnessed an 8 year old girl playing in their church's worship team. 'If she can do it, so can we' became the order of the day for the past few weeks. Since their parents saw no sense in signing them up for lessons or getting them a drum set to annoy the neighbours with, I volunteered to give them free lessons and probably a jam session or two. What better way to go back to basics than to hustle a couple of kids, eh?

Lesson number one was, of course, getting some sticks for the kids since all my spares were 5Bs and too big for their hands. Not being able to find anything suitable at the crappy Yamaha retail store, we headed down to Drum Resources as I only trusted Nigel and nobody else. True enough, he actually stocked some Pro Mark Junior sticks, which I eventually bought for Natalie and Velouria (who INSISTED on having her own pair as well). For Justin and Deon, a pair of medium weight, ball tipped 7As each ince I reckoned their grubby paws were huge enough to hang on to a regular pair of sticks.

Lesson number two will commence at the next Hushhouse jamming session at Mel's place. But first they'll have their exams to contend with.

Light at the end of the tunnel

A strange sense of deja vu had been plaguing me the past few months. It seemed that my life has been moving in circles and I kept asking God where all this was leading me to. Desperately wanting to understand God's will for my life, I was worshipping and waiting upon the Lord more fervently that I was normally used to.

I have always wondered to God why he never gave me an interest or talent in the financial, real estate or business arena - stuff that would REALLY earn the big bucks. And suddenly, like an epiphany, He pointed me towards the direction of education. It was like a refreshing splash of cool, clear water on my otherwise sullen and distraught spirit. I had been lamenting about not being able to find a job that I enjoy or something that was recession proof so that I didn't have to keep worrying about whether the gloomy economy would affect my paycheck and other similary nonsensical thoughts.

It was an epiphay because I had always loved teaching. I love working with children because it gives me a sense of immense satisfaction by imparting my life skills and knowledge to the younger generation with the hope that my (sometimes harsh) words would help mould them into valuable and effective individuals in future.

Going so far as to submit an application for a teaching post with MOE (which I never got a reply for so I assumed that is water under the bridge), I had a friend who introduced me a training post in a company which specialises in 'contextual learning'. The beauty of this system is that it not only applies to the education field, but can also be used for corporate training. It's basically a psychological technicality that simpletons like me would not be able to wrap my mind around. Yet.

I'm not at liberty to share too many details. Yet. But God has been great and I can finally see that small glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. God had opened a floodgate of blessing which I am suddenly afraid to take on because I know I am not capable of handling it with my own strength. I continue to wait upon the Lord to guide me.

I'm humbled and awe-struck by what God has revealed to my heart. All I had to do was just trust and seek him.

Hungry for Hungarian Goulash

It's hard to find a nice, thick Hungarian Goulash these days. I'm talking those with chunky bits of beef, potatoes, carrots and beans. Instead, the order of the day seems to be those sissy, diluted ones with no beef in sight (probably just strands of it) and what I absolutely detest is that they stew it so long till the teeny cubes of potatoes just melt away in your mouth before you can even land your molars on them.

We chanced upon Soup-erlicious, a soup café (which are another dime in a dozen these days), in Suntec one weekend. After walking around in Carrfefour, Vel complained that she was hungry and wanted some bread. Thinking that how boring it was just to eat bread alone, I suggested why not have some soup to go along after sighting the café as the nearest eatery to go to as we stepped through the check out counters. In actual fact, it was a ploy to find something substantial to fill my stomach as I was feeling slightly peckish as well.

To my amazement, the goulash was wonderful! It came with pieces of foccacias cut up into rectangular blocks (making it ultra easy for dipping) and the soup was the thick, gooey and chunky kind that I loved and missed so dearly. The soup was fragrant and flavourful, yet the beef was tender and the chunks of potatoes and carrots still had a nice crunch to them.

It was supposed to be a snack but the bowl was so huge that after draining it dry and wiping up the sides with the foccacia, I was stuffed (not Velouria though)!

Yummy indeed! I’ll definitely be back for more. My next target – Wild Mushroom Soup!

Dinosaur eggs and Bee-Bee

Another sign of my entry into premature mid-life crisis – I’ve been longing for snacks that I used to nibble on as a kid. For some strange reason, I had been reminiscing about those colourful little egg-shaped candies that we used to affectionately call ‘dinosaur eggs,’ owing to the colourful and speckled exterior of the chewy confection. Just the mere pondering on where I could get some kept me awake on many countless nights.

Surprisingly, I chanced upon these little treasures at the mamak stall tucked away in a discreet corner when we were at Bras Basah Complex one day. Of course, I bought a pack (along with a couple of packets of Bee-Bee to go around) and savoured them sparingly over the next few days (there are still a couple left in the fridge).

What can I say? Shiok, man!

The H.E.A.R.T. of worship

Attended RHC's worship workshop cum audition held by Aidan on Saturday. I'd been looking forward to this day since I read about it on the monthly flyer three weeks back. Honestly, I couldn't wait to getting back to playing with a worship team but yet felt somewhat consternated as I knew the people here seemed to be more technically inclined than what I was used to back at NCS i.e. there was no more ‘blur in, blur out’ anymore!

As a member of the worship team, I was taught that we should offer our best to God in terms of skill which involved constant practice and an effort towards self-improvement. Frankly, I didn't think my drumming was anything fantastic given the fact that I'd never had any professional training and am beginning to feel my co-ordination (or lack thereof?) get the better of me. That, of course, also does not mean that an absolutely tone deaf person should attempt to sing back-up.

I'd become so preoccupied with giving God my best that I'd forgotten to check what I was offering to Him. Psalm 78:72 says that ‘…with integrity of heart, with skillful hands he led them’. To put it simply, the skills are as every bit as important as the heart, one is not of more importance than the other. While not exactly a revelation, this concept has sort of been relegated to the back of my mind as I became preoccupied with learning the guitar (with the hope of picking up the bass some day) and drumming my a** off week after week.

The H.E.A.R.T. of worship consists being:
Humble – humbled by God’s awesome grace
Expectant – that God will pour out His presence in the midst of our worship and do something radical in our hearts.
Attentive – to how the Holy Spirit is moving
Real – God asks us to worship in spirit and in truth
Together – every individual united as one to build God’s house and see that His will is done (dialokismos in Greek – means to be of one mind and one accord)

Damn cheem. But still essential nevertheless.

Pigging out - a 'hum'-ful night

Penny was down with a really bad bout of flu for the past two weeks. When she finally did recover (not fully), we thought that it was only fitting that we celebrated it with a rather restrained pig out session at East Coast hawker centre (which is kind of an oxymoron when you think about it) since we didn't want her falling sick again soon after she had gotten well. Having being deprived of all the evil fried and oily food for the duration of her illness, she was craving for all the wrong things.

We started our feast with a plate of chicken wings, some satay and a couple of drinks. When we realised that all that stuff could barely fill us, Penny went in search of more grub to gobble up. Gone for a good ten minutes, she returned with a plate of the famous (but only okay by my standards - I still prefer the one at Balestier) satay bee hoon and, horror of horrors, a plate of see hum!

Armed with a toothpick and a saucer of sambal belachan, we went at it and soon all that was left was splattered blood and a pile of shells on the table. The cockles were barely cooked but that was what gave them that signature crunchiness. I never felt so disgusted but yet equally satisfied at the same time.

As always, we left rubbing our tummies, deeply satisfied with our meal.

Balloting @ St. Margaret's

Ten harrowing days. That’s how long it was from the time we registered to the day of balloting at St. Margaret’s. We trusted that the Lord would place Velouria there but the thought of 78 people vying for 73 places was still enough to place a fragment of doubt in your heart (having two sets of twins in the list of names didn’t help ease matters much either).

So there we were at 7.45 a.m. (Penny was sure that the balloting started at 8 a.m.) thinking we could chill out somewhere and have a coffee. The canteen was out of bounds so we headed straight to the school hall and counted every single minute to 8.30 a.m., when the balloting would begin.

As the seconds ticked on, more parents started streaming in. We were quite pleased with the fact the chaplain of the school opened the session in prayer at 8.30 a.m. on the dot, then off we went as the principal presented the ballot slips to the audience (via those old school projectors – they still have some use after all!) one by one before placing them into the box.

When the balloting began, the atmosphere was so tense that you would imagine someone getting thrown out if he so much as let out a fart. God spared us further torment as Velouria’s name was called out quite soon (didn’t keep count but reckoned it was within the first twenty). We were so relieved, but yet at the same time still felt quite tense for those parents whose daughters’ names had not been called yet.

But in the end, we all knew there had to be five who were not able to get in. Again, the chaplain closed the session in prayer and asked for God to guide those five girls and their respective parents. Praise the Lord! This is exactly the kind of environment we wanted for Velouria.

New beginning - reprise

So here we were. Our first Sunday out from New Covenant Sanctuary. It was a day we'd been looking forward to, with trepidation due to the new and unfamliar environment, and with anticipation with the knowledge that we were working towards bringing our walk with God to a whole new level. We'd been here before and we were comfortable. It wasn't a big church with tens of thousands of people, a huge stage for the worship team that looked more like a rock concert. But most importantly, we identified with Pastor Simon's vision of centering all aspects of church and personal activity around God's Word, with all else being secondary. Knowing it well was one thing, but applying it was a whole new ball game altogether.

Redemption Hill now had two services - one at 9.30 a.m., the other at 11.30 a.m. We figured it'd be better for us to attend the latter as it would give us some time after the service was over to speak with Pastor Simon and introduce ourselves as we had promised.

The worship was simple and touching. It has been a long time since I let my tears flow freely during corporate worship. The sermon was straightforward but impactful as well - Pastor Simon was speaking about work life and how we should use that to glorify God. It sort of changed my perspective of work and slogging it out with survival as the usual excuse.

We mingled around a bit and even got ourselves into one of the cell groups who meet every Friday evening at Hillview. Cool! We promsied that we would make ourselves available then. Grabbing some biscuits and drinks, we left the service feeling somewhat refreshed and burden-less (for lack of a better word).

We are REALLY looking forward to next Sunday. Haven't felt like this in a long time.

Pri 1 registration

The dreadful day that we've been waiting for had finally arrived - it was time to register Velouria for her Primary school!

After scratching off the option of MGS from our list (given their track record of not having vacancies for Phase 2C), we were left with St. Margaret's. Our resources indicated that they were not very academically inclined but we didn't really care. Who wants to put their kids in a school where they had to go through tons of revision papers every day and had to burn their Saturdays having extra lessons anyway? We sure don't! Most importantly, we wanted a school with a Godly environment that would nurture Velouria's desire to walk with God as she grew up.

Being the typical un-kiasu parents that we were, we sauntered our way into the school in the afternoon on the first day of registration. We went through the usual registration routine, which nowadays also includes a mandatory temperature taking, and waited for further instructions. The entire process took less than 15 minutes before the teacher came back to us with a couple of forms and told us 'That's it! Wait for the results to be announced after the last day of registration'. Satisfied, we went home.

It turns out that out of the 127 vacancies in Phase 2C for St. Margaret's, there were 132 applicants. Which means that we would have to go through the nail-biting process of balloting. And to deepen the suspense, we had to wait till 11 August (after the National Day long weekend, dammit!) to do so.

We await with bated breath...

Getting into the groove

After being together for almost a year, we are finally getting our act together as a band. I am a subscriber of the notion that music soothes the savage beast. So what better way to end the work week than with a jamming session, in a nice studio downtown no less!

My Saturday afternoons have become preoccupied with other arrangements so our only option left was to jam elsewhere since Mel's home studio was a great big no in the evenings, lest the neighbours should complain about the din we were making. It is therefore also subtly ironic that we are currently toying with the name Hush House, considering the amount of noise we make and distortion we use in our music.

So we found ourselves at Shiin Studio on North Canal Road (just above Settler's Cafe) where Mel apparently also jams with his other outfits. Cosy little place with two small studios, but with some rather decent equipment. Finally, a nice set of tight, tuned drums to pamper my sticks with. Here, they were equipped with a 6-piece Gretsch that came with double pedals (not that I needed them anyway - getting too old for that s**t).

All in all, a great (but albeit costly) evening of wonderful music making. We even got to try out our cover of Beach Boys' Don't Worry Baby with me on backing vocals. Cool!

New beginning

After months of hesitating and asking God for direction, we finally came to a decision to leave New Covenant Sanctuary. Maybe it's just us, but Sunday after Sunday, I feel that Penny and I were just going through the motion of going to church and serving our respective ministries. I cried out to God and asked for forgiveness that we'd become so passive. What had happened? We don't even know. I guess we came to a point where we were fed up of everything going in circles, and church was the last place we'd expect to deal with spirals.

Many have asked us - what if it was God's will for us to be placed in NCS, wouldn't we be going against His will by leaving? It's a case of being stuck between a rock and a hard place - we'd be damned if we did and damned if we didn't. Again, I prayed for forgiveness and told God that I'd rather sin in an attempt to get closer to Him than to remain there and sin anyway by harbouring so much bitterness that would kill our spiritual lives eventually.

I couldn't bear to leave everything that we tried so hard to build up, but I asked myself 'Would I be able to make a difference?'. In the end, it's all about doing it for His glory and not mine. I remember the prophecy given to me was that I'd work with youth of THE church; the prophecy didn't say THIS church, so I comfort myself with the thought that it's still His house no matter where we serve.

If it was really God's will for us to be there, guess He would send a 'big fish' to 'swallow' us up and spit us out back there.

We continue to pray for the people of NCS as we begin a new chapter in our walk with Christ.

Beaten at Monopoly Junior

I suck at Monopoly. In fact, I suck so bad that even Velouria can beat me. And we're not even talking about the standard Monopoly. We're talking about Monopoly Junior. With smaller notes. Less expensive property. Lesser squares.

Velouria had just gotten a hand me down set and I, being the kiasu parent attempting to educate her about the benefits of board games, decided to have a go at it with her.

The set came without any manual, so I distrbuted $100 to both of us and off we went. Being the aggressive 'businessman' with no strategy whatsoever, I just started buying up all the property that my token landed on. Just my luck that I got all the cheap, crappy ones. Velouria, on the other hand, was a scheming strategist that would have put Donald Trump to shame, buying up properties after a tremendous amount of thought. Only God knows what went on in her head in the midst of all that contemplation.

It seemed to have worked however. In the end, after mortgaging all my houses and selling off all my property, I had no moolah in my box. In stark contrast, Velouria had a handful of blue (her colour of choice) houses left on the board and a considerable stash of cash in her box.

Beaten by a six... no, five and a half year old girl, in a board game designed for pre school children. Major bummer.

Hilarious TVC

Rarely does a TVC catch my eye - most have got me reaching for the remote to channel surf, bolting to the washroom for a quick pee break or waltzing to the kitchen in search of something to satisfy my insatiable appetite for the munchies.

The last one that got me to sit up and notice (not to mention make me tear even) was Leo Burnett's TVC for MCYS's 'Beautifully Imperfect' campaign. Other than that, most other ads simply make me cringe:

a. with lousy acting (the Allwell herbal drinks with the couple at a hawker centre)
b. with cheesy, hard sell scripts (the Sinsin Soya Sauce ad with the grandma advising the dude against OD'ing his food with soya sauce and the wife jumps to his defense by saying that it's low salt, blah, blah)
c. just by being downright irritating (the Carlsberg ad with the beer and foosball table delivered to three dudes camping on a ledge of a snowy mountain)
d. all of the above

I happened to catch Heineken's new TVC today. Honestly, it caught me completely off guard and I thought it was going to be another silly TVC advertising some household product or some other contraption you DO NOT need in the home.

Damn funny lah. From a guy's point of view anyway.

Open up the sky

It is good to praise the LORD and make music to your name, O Most High, to proclaim your love in the morning and your faithfulness at night
Psalm 92:1-2

I've played the drums for the longest time. When I offered my talent to the worship ministry, I did it with the intention of offering my best to the Lord knowing that this was one thing I knew I could do well without screwing up too badly. I love music and I have experienced first hand what the power of worship can do. While I take my drumming very seriously, I also love to sing and it was my hope that one day I would be able to lead the congregation in worship. To lead them to that realm of worship in order experience the touch of the Holy Spirit.

I take my drumming very seriously. Really!

Since I had some kucing kurap guitar skills, Daniel thought it'd be a good idea for me to try playing some songs. I'd led a few praise songs over the past few weeks, my signature tune being Tim Hughes' Beautiful One (I chose it for the simple chord structure and crowd 'ra-ra' factor - I'd heard him playing it live at the Planetshaker's concert last year).

Just last Sunday, Daniel decides that I should try leading the whole praise and worship. Praise wasn't going to be a problem, but worship was a totally different matter altogether. I decided to try Deluge's rendition of Open Up The Sky although I wasn't entirely sure if we could pull it off since the original was so heavy.

My benchmark for a good worship song is that it has to make your hair stand the first you hear it and cry the second. I cried the first time I heard this song and I had it on repeat in the car's CD player until the A-E-D-A riff was etched ever so clearly into my head. I have since played it umpteen times in my own worship with the Lord. Somehow the words of the pre chorus and chorus kept resounding in my head.

We won't be satisfied with anything ordinary
We won't be satisfied at all

Open up the sky
Fall down like rain
We don't want blessings we want You
Open up the sky
Fall down like fire
We don't want anything but You

It had been my prayer that our congregation be overwhelmed with the Holy Spirit during worship and the chorus seemed to echo that thought. For the Lord to fall down like rain and fire to completely engulf and surround us.

I just let the Spirit lead me when it was time to play. At one point, everyone just stopped the instruments and we just sang our hearts out. It wasn't even my intention at all but it all flowed so perfectly. Amazing what God can do when you surrender completely to His perfect will.

Can't wait to do it again.